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Show President Willing to Abandon Policy of Isolation Iso-lation to Which the Country Is Committed by the Monroe Doctrine Doc-trine and Help Maintain Main-tain Peace of the World. OBJECT OF NOTES AGAIN EXPLAINED Information Is Wanted as to the Exact Meaning Mean-ing of the Belligerents in Statements Made as to Terms Upon Which the War Can Be Stopped. LONDON, Dec. 23, 9:50 p. in. A Frankfurt dispatch to the Exchange Ex-change Telegraph company via Rotterdam Rot-terdam says there was heavy betting bet-ting on the Berlin exchange today that peace would be signed before August. The same dispatch says that the German emperor will return re-turn to Berlin for conference with the American and Spanish ambassadors. ambas-sadors. WASHINGTON, Doc. 2 J. Information Informa-tion as to their exact meaning iu becking beck-ing a r;ust and permanent peace" is the whole purpose of the uoto addrcsecd to all the belligerents by President Wilson. Wil-son. The United States desires a full, practical and detailed statement from each of tho governments addressed. This outline and what follows was stated officially of-ficially today for the administration. This government docs not know, and feels that it has been given no real means of knowing, what terms would be requested by each of tho belligerents to make peace. It regards the recent speeches of tho leading statesmen in all countries as vague and undefined, and sees nothing in them that would enable a conference to draw up a trenty. AH speak of the rights of small nations, the repugnanco of conquest and tho guarantees guar-antees of a permanent peace, but no one nation has yet gone into -what it moans by those phrases in a way that the government gov-ernment of tho United States can understand. un-derstand. Vagueness Enhanced. Kecent press comment has been taken to enhance that vagueness. Prance, for instance, has not disclosed if what sho considers a just pcaeo means tho evacuation evacu-ation of her northern provinces, or, in addition to that, tho restoration of Al-pace Al-pace Lorraine, or if, in addition to both those (daims, she expects a money indemnity in-demnity for the 'damage of invasion, or, beyond that, if she has an actual programme for doing away with fco-c fco-c ailed Germ a n militarism. In short, the United Slates iisks what would she accept today as the basis of peace. Similar issues apply to all the belligerent bellig-erent countries in merely a varying form. What President Wilson wants ia their details. As the largest neutral facing grave problems, and as the friend of all parties eoneerned, the United .States feels most earnestly that it is entitled en-titled to know those, facts. Basis Is Needed. Unless some one of t ho groups lays down its actual terms there will lie no basis for n'-uotiatiou and no possibility of peaec tilJ the world is bled white, offi'-ials declare. There is not the slightest expectation here that the terms laid down will bo reeoiieilKilde, ;it first. It is known that some of the nations will demand what, in aetualitv. i impossible. Nevertheless, Neverthe-less, the naming of those terms will afford af-ford a basis of negotiations, a starting place from which the conflicting interest; inter-est; enn begin to converge. Nor is any embarrassment seen to any of the nations in naming such terms. Jt is under.t nod jn il V;i nee that thev nre not. to i hi-tnate v.-. h the military changes, and are ii"t perma n en 1 1 v binding bind-ing under new enn - lit ions. Whatever any nation feels must be included in its (Continued on Fajo Two.) , , SHIS . S. IS READY TO ENTER COMPACT (Continued from Page One.) terms for moral reasons can aUo be addd to the, toruii without embarrassment, embarrass-ment, it is said. As permanent guarantees, it was officially declare 1 that the United States .stands r--ady to enter any kind of international agreement that may seem must desirable to the nations, wether permanent peace is to be secured se-cured by force, if necessary, or by law. The country is not com mil ted to any one plan, and President Wilson is entirely en-tirely open to suggestions. It is the ad- ministration view that the country can ; he committed to an abandonment of the , policy of isolation much as President Monroe committed it to the Monroe doc-; doc-; trine wit hout senate action. In the ; plans so far contemplated, however, it ! is probable the nations would be bound ' by treaty agreements which would necessarily have to be ratified by the j senate, so far as the United States is : concerned. A fuller understanding of the era-i era-i barrassment caused to the administra- tion by the coincidence of its note with j the German proposals was given today when it was said that, despite the early unfavorable effect which the note was expected to have in the allied countries through that fact, it was decided to risk it, in view of the great interests involved. in-volved. It is expected that it may be some time before the American viewpoint view-point will be accepted abroad, but it is felt that in the end it certainly will prevail. It also was stated most emphatically that the note was not rushed off on Monday in order to got to Premier Lloyd George before he had irrevocably committed the allies against peace in his speech to parliament Tuesday. That assumption was foreseen, but officials expect it to lose weight and importance1 as the first impressions wear oft. 1 The earlv resentment in London and Paris on the assumption that the president presi-dent 's note declared both belligerents were fighting for the same object is regarded as unwarranted at the state department, where it was said today great pains had been taken to avoid that very inference. Stress was laid on the president's words to show that he had not expressed any conviction that both sets of belligerents bel-ligerents were fighting for the same objects. ob-jects. On the other hand, the language of the note, it was pointed out, specifically specifi-cally said the statesmen of both groups of belligerents had so stated their objects ob-jects in general terms to the people of their own countries. Officials were gratified to soe this view being pointed out in some of the later foreign comment received today. Written After Study. The phrase was written, it was said, after study of the more recent statements state-ments of the belligerents, rather than the statements at the time thev entered the war. Then the avowed objects of all the nations were more specific, Italv, for instance, coming into the war with an official statement of what she felt necessary for her future. Since then, however, on ail sides it is felt a constantly con-stantly increasing vagueness has been coming up, which now is expanding into the most nebulous terms. General hostility to the note at first, both in allied and Teutonic countries, as conveyed in news dispatches, was regarded re-garded by officials as one of the most hopeful signs, as it indicated that the note was neutral. Especially was the hostility in some of the German papers pleasing, as it was thought that when the allies realized that the plan was not so welcome to their enemies they would give to it more earnest and more impartial consideration. The possibility of an earlv reply is discounted here. The central powers have indicated that they will not risk laying down their peace terms until they have had a reply to their own proposals from the entente. While the reply now is nearly finished, it will take a week to distribute it to the various va-rious powers. The entente, having both that reply and the president's note to consider, and consisting of ten different nations, all with different interests, is expected to require considerable time to get its views into shape for transmission. transmis-sion. The allies' reply to the central powers will not be made public here. Russia Gets Note. PETROGRAD. Dec. 23. The American ambassador. David R. Francis has delivered de-livered the American peace note to the Russian government. The Novoe Vremya points out that the nole was transmitted without comment and says: "The American government is not lettine itself be tripped upon the string stretched bv the astute Germans Having charged itself with the formal representation with both the German and Russian interests, the American government govern-ment limits itself merely to present the German document." j Holland Thanks Wilson. THE HAGTE, Dec. 53. via London, 2:30 p. m. The Dutch anti-war council has sent the following cablegram to President Presi-dent Wilson: Holland thanks you for your efforts ef-forts in favor of lasting peace. All neutral nations ;?reet vbur step with the greatest sympathy and sunport your noble efforts in the interests of the whole of humanity. Italy Is Informed. ROME, Dec. 23. via Paris, ll:3f a m Thomas Nelson Pa?e. the American ambassador am-bassador at Rome, tndav handed to Baron Ronnino, the Italian foreign minister, min-ister, the note from President Wilson "con ta miner a suets??? tion on the subject of a plan of action concerning the war." |
